The 2 dam projects – Kaliwa Dam and Laiban Dam- on Sierra Madre would tap water from Agos River in Sierra Madre supposedly to supply potable water to Metro Manila. These projects are being hailed by Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) as the New Centennial Water Source Projects under the Public-Private Partnership Program with a projected budget of P88 billion pesos (Kaliwa Dam – 23B, Laiban Dam - 65B).These dam projects would flood 37,700 hectares of watershed areas including ancestral lands belonging to the indigenous Dumagat and Remontado tribes and would submerge 8 barangays of Tanay, Rizal namely; Sta. Ynes, Mamuyao, Tinucan, Cayabu, San Andres, Sto. Nino, Laiban and Daraitan. These will also submerge Barangay Lumutan and part of Barangay Pagsangahan of Gen. Nakar, Quezon. Even the MWSS acknowledged that the dam projects would displace more than 8,000 families living in the area including more than 4,000 families of indigenous Dumagat and Remontado tribal people.

To be constructed in the mountain village of Pagsangahan, General Nakar town, Quezon Province is the Kaliwa Dam, a 62-meter-high concrete-face, rock-filled dam (CFRD) with a projected capacity of 600 million liters per day (MLD) and will flood a watershed area of more than 9,700 hectares affecting more or less 1,500 families. To be constructed in Barangay Laiban, Tanay, Rizal is the Laiban Dam, a 113-meter-high CFRD with a projected capacity of 1,800 MLD and will inundate more or less 28,000 hectares of watershed areas affecting more or less 7,000 families. These dam projects had no free prior and inf0rmed consent (FPIC) from the Dumagat and Remontado tribe, as mandated under the Indigenous Peoples Rights Act No. 8371, or IPRA of 1997 to protect the rights of the indigenous peoples .

These dam projects was started by the Marcos regime. The succeeding regime of Fidel Ramos, Joseph Estrada and Gloria Arroyo tried to continue but was forced to shelve the project because of the organized resistance of the people of Rizal and Quezon supported by the church people, pro-indigenous people individuals, environmentalists and the armed revolutionary groups led by the CPP-NPA-NDFP. Every regime, starting from Marcos and the succeeding regimes including the much hated Arroyo regime salivated from the expected profits they would pocket once these projects becomes operational. They all tried but eventually failed.

Now, it is the US-BS Aquino regime’s time to try to continue this project. In his State of the Nation Address last July 2014, he said that the dam projects in Sierra Madre were among the several public-private partnership programs he had approved for immediate implementation. The US-BS Aquino regime and his cohorts want to dip their hands and make this project their milking cow. They are not contented with pocketing pork barrel funds through DAP and PDAF. This time, BS Aquino wants the peoples fund to be pocketed by his relatives, with the presidential uncle, Eduardo “Danding” Cojuangco at the helm of the project. The Laiban Dam project is now a joint venture of Danding Cojuangco who owned San Miguel Corporation and the MWSS. The BS Aquino regime is hell-bent to have the Sierra Madre dams constructed even with overwhelming opposition from the people.

To quell the widespread opposition of the people against the dam projects, the BS Aquino regime ordered the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP) to guard the dams and safeguard the interests of Danding Cojuangco and MWSS. He has unleashed the “Butcher” Philippine Army forces, namely the 1st IB-PA and 16th IB-PA. Members of the 16th IB-PA had been strategically deployed in villages that will be submerged by the Laiban Dam project, in the mountain villages of Tanay, Rizal, namely Laiban, Cayabu, Sta- Inez, Tinucan, Mamuyao, San Andres, Sto. Nino, Daraitan and Lumutan, Nakar Quezon. While the 1st IB-PA forces are strategically deployed in Kaliwa Dam area in the mountain villages of Nakar, Quezon namely; Pagsangahan, Umiray, San Marcelino, Canaway and Magsaysay, Infanta, Quezon. These barangays are now teeming with Philippine Army troops with strict orders to suppress and quell the peoples' movement against the Sierra Madre Dam Projects.

But the people of Rizal and Quezon province will not be cowed. They are determined to oppose the dam projects and with massive protest coupled with the armed resistance of the revolutionary movements in Rizal and Quezon, the wish of BS Aquino regime will surely fail. The efforts of the people together with the revolutionary movement will surely frustrates the ruling regime's plan.

The Rosemarie Lodronio Rosal Command – (RLRC-NPA-Mt Sierra Madre-Southern Tagalog Sub-Regional Command), with the support ot the people vows to launch tactical offensives to stop the construction of Sierra Madre Dams and all anti-people project of the reactionary government posing as development projects. The successive tactical offensives launched last July 2014 in General Nakar, Quezon which resulted to 5 casualties from the government troops and in Tanay and Montalban, Rizal by members of RLRC-NPA is a living testament of the increasing capacity of the revolutionary movement in Sierra Madre to punish the plunderers of Mt. Sierra Madre. Together with the people of Rizal and Quezon Province, we will prevail against the onslaught of the BS Aquino regime and his AFP mercenaries. The dam projects will be stopped and the ancestral lands of the Dumagat and Remontado tribe will be free from environmental destruction.